FSP Group, known for its power supply units, has announced two new additions to its CPU cooler lineup, the Windale 4 and Windale 6.

The new FSP Windale 4 and Windale 6 coolers will be able to handle 180W and 240W TDP CPUs, respectively, and feature a standard tower CPU cooler design with direct contact heatpipes as well as a 120mm fan.

The smaller, Windale 4 cooler, has 122 x 83 x 158mm dimensions and has four 6mm heatpipes, which also means that the heatsink is slightly slimmer. The Windale 6, as the name suggests, comes with six 6mm heatpipes, making it slightly larger at 122 x 110 x 165mm, as well as a black heatsink and a blue LED 120mm fan.

As noted, both new Windale CPU coolers have a special low-noise 120mm fan with anti-vibration rubber mounting pins, which spins between 600 and 1600 RPM, and a special solder-less louver fin assembly for the heatsink, which should bring increased heatpipe effectiveness.

Unfortunately, FSP Group did not reveal any details regarding the price or the availability date but we suspect that these could show up in retail/e-tail pretty soon and could be a decent competition in the mainstream CPU cooler market.

Following the success of its earlier released XLC Predator AIO liquid CPU coolers, EK Water Blocks has now announced two new models that will be coming with 140mm and 280mm radiators, Quick Disconnect Connector and new 140mm EK-Vardar fan(s), the EK-XLC Predator 140 and EK-XLC Predator 280.

Unlike most AiO liquid CPU coolers on the market which place the pump on top of the water block, the EK-XLC Predator integrates the reservoir and the pump with the radiator.

According to details provided by EK Water Blocks, the EK-XLC Predator 280 features a well-known EK-Supremacy MX CPU water block and comes with the new EK-CoolStream CE 280 radiator, coupled with two high-static pressure 140mm EK-Vardar fans. The radiator also comes with EKWB's Hovercore design which prevents the transfer of vibrations from the radiator as well as integrates EK-SPC liquid cooling pump.

The radiator was also further re-designed to hide all the cables, which are attached to an integrated fan splitter hub with only one PWM cable going to the CPU fan socket and single SATA Molex that powers the entire unit. The EK-SPC liquid cooling pump is PWM controlled and has a maximum pressure head at 3.2m (10,5 ft) with a maximum flow of 450 L/h.

The EK-XLC Predator 280 and EK-XLC Predator 140 also feature EKWB's Quick Disconnect Connector (QDC), which allows a quick and tool-less expansion of the system without the need to drain the unit.

The EK-XLC Predator 140 is identical to the 280 model apart from the smaller 140 EK-CoolStream CE radiator. While the EK-XLC Predator 280 comes with QDC, the EK-XLC Predator 140 will be available with and without the QDC and is mostly aimed at smaller mini-ITX builds.

According to EKWB, both new EK-XLC Predator AiO liquid CPU coolers will be available for pre-order on September 9th and available worldwide on September 30th. Unfortunately, EKWB still hasn't finalized the price but that information should be available in the coming weeks.

In case you missed it, the new Wraith CPU cooler was originally available only with the AMD A10-7890K APU, its fastest A-series Godavari APU with two Steamroller CPU modules (four CPU cores) and Radeon R7 GPU with 8 Compute Units (512 Stream Processors). AMD also had a different version of the Wraith CPU cooler, without the fancy shroud and LEDs, which was available on the Athlon X4 880K and the A10-7870K APU.

Now, it appears that the Wraith CPU cooler will be also be bundled with the AMD FX-8350 AM3+ 125W octa-core CPU as well as the six-core FX-6350. The FX-6350 is also a Black Edition CPU with a 125W TDP and comes with 3.9GHz base and 4.2GHz Turbo clocks, while the FX-8350 works at 4.0GHz base and 4.2GHz Turbo clocks.

According to earlier reviews, AMD's Wraith CPU cooler has proven to be an impressive CPU cooler with both decent performance and impressively low noise levels, even leaving behind some after-market CPU coolers.

Arctic has rather silently launched its new Alpine M1 passive CPU cooler designed to be used with Intel LGA 115x CPUs with TDP of up to 47W.

Since it can support up to 47W TDP Intel socket LGA 1150, LGA 1151, LGA 1155 and LGA 1156, this rather limits the list of the CPUs that can be cooled by Alpine M1 to most Core i3, Pentium and Celeron, as well as certain Core i5 CPUs.

To be precise, Arctic notes that CPUs with TDP of over 35W may reduce the clock during longer periods of full load. The design is also quite straightforward as it is practically just a simple aluminum heatsink that comes with a pre-applied MX-2 thermal paste.

The precise dimensions of the Alpine M1 are 95x95x69mm and it weighs 508g, which should also make it fit in most PC cases.

Arctic has unveiled two new CPU coolers for AMD's socket AM1 which should be much better than noisy stock CPU cooler, the Alpine M1 and Alpine M1-Passive.

Designed to offer maximum performance on AMD's AM1 socket without breaking the bank, Artic Alpine M1 and Alpine M1-Passive should keep the AM1 CPUs much cooler than reference AM1 cooler and also come with pre-applied MX-2 thermal compound.

The Alpine M1 is based on a slim aluminum heatsink paired with an 80mm low speed fan, making it twice as quiet compared to the stock AM1 CPU cooler. The precise dimensions of the Arctic Alpine M1 are set at 80x80x41mm which should go well with small AMD AM1 motherboards.

The Alpine M1-Passive, as the name suggests, is completely passive and silent, but features a slightly larger dimensions of 77x77x70. This will allow users to make a completely fan-less AM1 system and should be enough for any AM1 CPU with cooling capacity of 40W.

Both new socket AM1 CPU coolers from Arctic should be available on retail/e-tail shelves soon with a price set at €11.95 for the Alpine M1 and €12.95 for the Alpine M1-Passive.

Gelid Solutions have announced the new SlimHero CPU low-profile cooler, a new member of its Silent line of products.

Based on a combination of copper heatpipes and uniquely shaped heatsink that lower the air flow resistance, the new SlimHero comes with a silent and slim 120mm fan with PWM control. The full height of the cooler is 59mm, making it suitable for most if not all SFF cases but also ends up with enough cooling power to cope with up to 136W TDP CPUs.

The new SlimHero supports Intel socket 775/1155/1156/1366 and AMD AM2/AM2+/AM3/AM3+/FM1/FM2 sockets and should be available immediately with an MSRP of US $32 or €25.

Intel‘s Socket 2011 is new solution for high-end desktop, workstation and server processors. We know that the new socket retained compatibility with Socket 1366 cooling solutions, but old CPU coolers will require a special mounting kit. Today, we’ll show you the parts we had to order for Thermalright’s HR-02 and briefly cover existing coolers that are compatible with Socket 2011. Note that we only chose a few randomly picked CPU cooler manufacturers so the list is not complete.

Mounting high-end CPU coolers on LGA2011 has been simplified compared to LGA1366, because there’s no need to mount a backplate. Socket 2011 is fixed on the motherboard and will take the weight of the heaviest and largest CPU coolers.

As you can see from the picture below there are no traditional holes through the PCB. There is now a metal bracket that has been tapped to accept M4 screws.

Socket 2011 is huge, it requires two retention levers.

Thermalright’s HR-02 cooler was launched almost two years ago and the original mounting kit is not compatible with Socket 2011. Still, it would be a pity to waste such a great cooler so we decided to order the Socket 2011 mounting kit.

For Thermalright’s HR-02 Macho/True Spirit 140/True Spirit and all models using the new universal Intel/AMD bracket, there is the new LGA2011 Retention Kit, comprising of a new 2011 Retention Bracket and 2011 Screw Pillar Type B.

You can see the LGA 2011 Adapter Kit with 4 2011 Screw Pillars for HR-02 cooler on the picture below.

Socket 2011 simplifies mounting of CPU coolers since it does not require a backplate. This means that you can mount it with the motherboard already inside the case.

The picture below shows the back of the socken on our X79 FTW motherboard; the holes in the PCB around the socket are sealed as the backplate is part of the socket itself.

Mounting HR-02 coolers on socket 2011 is basically the same as with socket 1366, with the exception of the first step, i.e. mounting a backplate. The four screws we got are screwed into the metal bracket tapped to accept M4 screws (picture below).

Thermalright’s HR-02 has proven to be a good cooler for semi-passive cooling so we decided to use it for testbenches of graphics cards on the new EVGA’s X79 FTW motherboard and Sandy Bridge-E CPU. We published a full blown review of this cooler some year and a half ago, and you can find the results here.

Thermalright HR-02 is an old but CPU cooler, but its quality is undeniable. Namely, it easily manages to cool Sandy Bridge-E CPUs on Socket 2011, despite the age difference. If you’re planning on exchanging Socket 1366 for Intel’s Socket 2011, all you need to do is order four screws, which cost us €2 here. In fact, you’ll find that mounting coolers on Socket 2011 is much simpler than with the 1366.

Anyhow, if you already have a good CPU cooler, we’d recommend not buying a new one but rather ask around whether your CPU cooler manufacturer offers adapter kits. On the following few pages you’ll find what CPU cooler makers have done with their existing products in order to ensure compatibility with Intel’s socket 2011

.

Included with the H80 and H100 are four standoffs that have a shorter wider end. These are for socket 2011. To get these parts for H70 and H60 you can create an RMA (for free), and the description section states that you only need the mounting parts (H40 an H50 are not supported). Corsair also offers two CPU coolers in its Air Series but for the time being there is no support for Socket 2011.

ZM-OC2011 Clip Support for mounting ZM-WB5 and ZM-WB5 Plus to Intel Socket LGA2011.

You can find those support kits at price about €6, here. Some od Zalmans coolers lilke CNPS12X comes with Nipples B for mounting on LGA2011.

Continuing Noctua's tradition of supplying customers with its premium-class SecuFirm2™ mountings free of charge, the NM-I2011 kit allows Noctua users to upgrade to Intel's LGA2011 socket for Core i7-39xx/38xx processors. The NM-I2011 set is backwards compatible with all Noctua retail coolers since 2005 and has been designed to combine outstanding reliability, optimal contact pressure and easy, straightforward installation. Bringing the trusted SecuFirm2™ quality to Intel's new LGA2011 platform, NM-I2011 is an enthusiast-grade mounting that meets the highest demands in safety, performance and ease-of-use.Owners of Noctua CPU coolers can obtain the NM-I2011 Mounting-Kit free of charge via this form.

A proof of purchase (photo, scan or screenshot of the invoice) of both a Noctua CPU cooler and either a socket LGA2011 mainboard or socket LGA2011 CPU are required.

If you are owner of the folowing CPU coolers: Alpenföhn K2, Himalaya or Matterhorn rev.B, you can order the Upgrade Kit via mail for free here. In order to get it you have to produce an invoice and send a photo or a screenshot of it.

Our today’s guest is Cooler Master Hyper 612S (RR-H612-13FK-R1) CPU cooler. Users are surely familiar with Cooler Master’s Hyper series by now, as it can be found both in mid-range and high-end segments.

The company launched its Hyper 6 back in 2004, and followed it up with Hyper 6+ in 2005; Hyper Z600 in 2008 and Hyper 612S/ Hyper 612PWM in July 2011.

When it comes to cooling, size definitely matters and it is set to stay that way. However, almost all high end CPU coolers have hit maximum allowed sizes (maximum size for high-end CPU coolers is limited by case sizes), which means that companies had to resort to intelligent designs in order to fend off the competition.

The Hyper 612S seems like a classic big tower case at a glance – it has an aluminum heatsink and six heatpipes. However, you’ll notice that Hyper 612S’ heatpipes are placed horizontally and not vertically, the latter being more common. There’s also an additional heatsink placed directly on the base of the cooler, whereas the heatsinks aluminum plates are slightly more apart in order to maximize performance with low rpm fans.

Standard Hyper 612S comes with only one fan, but it will take two. Suggested retail pricing for Hyper 612S coolers stands at €40.

The Hyper 612S works with Intel and AMD sockets (see specs) and all the necessary mounting material is provided in the packaging. Inside you’ll also find an adapter cable, which will decrease fan speed from standard 1300 rpm to 900 rpm.

Without the fan and mounting mechanism, the Hyper 612S weighs in at 806 grams, which is about average for a high-end CPU air cooler. Heatsink is 163mm tall, meaning that you should check whether it will fit in your case. The heatsink is 136mm wide, and 100mm thick (measured without the fan).

The fan (A12025-13CB-3BN-F1, DC12V, 0.16A) comes strapped on the cooler, as the picture above shows. Its speed is fixed at 1300 rpm (+-10%) or 900 rpm if you opt on the quiet mode.

Those who like to hold reigns when it comes to controlling fan speed, or wish to leave it to the chipset, Cooler Master has an identical version but with PWM fan dubbed the Hyper 612PWM. PWM fan goes from 600 rpm to 2000 rpm, depending on the need.

Heatpipe placement is a bit out of the ordinary. Namely, Cooler Master placed them horizontally, instead of the more popular vertical placement.

The fan is fixed to the plastic bracket with screws (picture below), where the bracket can be easily removed and mounted again. Users also get another bracket for an optional fan, as well as grommets, which should help with suppressing vibration noise.

Cooler Master made sure to use every inch of free space to increase dissipation surface, which is why they used a smaller heatsink between the large one and the base of the cooler.

The large heatsink is pretty massive and wide, which is why the aluminum fins are spaced apart somewhat more than usual (2.4mm). This is especially important when the fan is set to run at 900 rpm or when users opt on semi-passive operation.

In order to prevent heat building up in the central part of the cooler, there are a few ventilation channels starting on the bottom and going towards the top. You won’t see the channels until you remove the two topmost aluminum fins.

Mounting the Hyper 612S is made easy with the new mounting system, which comprises from only a few parts. The hardest part of mounting the cooler was removing the glue that was left after taking the protective plastic off.

We tested the Hyper 612S on EVGA’s FTW3 motherboard in Corsair Obsidian 800D case, which has three 900 rpm fans. Room temperature was at 22°C. We measured temperatures at Core i7 930’s reference clocks (2.9GHz) and after overclocking to 3.6GHz.

We first tested with the reference fan and then added another one (Thermalright TR-TY-14cm 1300 rpm).

Cooler Master’s Hyper 612s is the most affordable cooler in the table, but it still holds its on quite nicely. The test results were made with the fan running at 1300rpm.

Hyper 612S comes with one fan (A12025-13CB-3BN-F1, DC12V, 0.16A), which was supposed to be quiet during operation. While the fan rpm can be decreased from 1300 rpm to 900 rpm with the adapter, we heard a quite unpleasant buzzing noise coming from the fan’s motor. As far as airflow noise goes, the fan is among the quieter we’ve tested thus far. In fact, when running at 900rpm, you won’t hear it, which is more than we can say for the buzzing sound.

Cooler Master Hyper 612S will be available at €39.90, VAT included. The price says it’s an upper mid-range part, although it has proven that it does quite well when compared to some high-end offerings.

The only downside, if there is any, is the noise fan motor, which doesn’t quite fit into the image of a quiet Hyper 612S. Despite being touted as super low noise, the fan buzzing should be addressed before strapping a product with such name. Cooler Master said that it opted against PWM fans because they’re noisy, so we can’t understand why the problem remained. As far as airflow noise goes, the fan is one of the quieter we’ve tested thus far. Once the rpm drops to 900, the fan is almost inaudible, bar the buzzing sound.

Cooler Master did a good job with Hyper 612S’ heatsink, which will love low rpm fans. The heatsink is massive and the distance between aluminum fins is 2.4mm. This means that the cooler will run great with quality airflow inside the case, so semi-passive operation is possible. You should make sure that it will fit in your case, since it is 163mm tall, but if it can – then the Hyper 612S should make your shopping list and will definitely serve you well.

Scythe has rolled out a new cooler that will surely be a star of any future HTPC systems that require at least some amount of more serious cooling power on the CPU.

The new Scythe Kozuti is only 40mm tall and weighs 250 grams. These specs don't mean that Kozuti doesn't pack a punch as it features three 6mm copper heatpipes a pretty large heatsink area and an 80mm slim fan that is actually placed below the heatsink in order to keep the height as low as possible. It supports Intel's LGA 775/1155/1156/1366 and AMD's AM2/AM2+/AM3/AM3+ socket CPUs.

The 80mm fan spins between 800 and 3300RPM and makes between 8.2 and 32.5 dBA of noise. Overall the cooler looks quite interesting and it has a suggested price tag of €22.90, which sounds like quite a good deal.

Today we’ll talk about Thermalright Archon CPU cooler, which launched sometime towards the end of 2010. Weighing in at 806g (without the fan and socket mounting parts) and measuring 17cm in height, Archon is a heavyweight CPU cooler with imposing tower looks and, hopefully, extraordinary performance.

The specially designed heatsink should provide improved dissipation. The package comes with Thermalright’s silent TR-TY 14cm fan and since Archon’s heatsink is 53mm wide, you can strap it with another 14cm fan in the so-called push-pull mode.

Archon’s competition in the high-end CPU cooling segment is pretty strong, but while there are many good coolers, not many stand out as being really special. So, let’s move on and see whether Archon has what it takes to stand out of the crowd.

As we’re used to seeing from Thermalright, packaging is a small but sturdy box.

You’ll find the name of the product on one side of the box, and that’s pretty much the only information that says what’s in the box.

Archon is cozily sitting inside protected with polyurethane foam.

Thermalright ships its TR-TY 140 fan (140mm) with Archon cooler as well as fan-clips for two fans and parts for mounting the cooler on AMD and Intel sockets.

Two manuals with plenty of pictures will help you mount Archon in no time.

Archon’s heatsink measures (L)155mm X (W)53mm X (H)170.25mm, which means it’s a high tower-design cooler. Although its dimensions are similar to those of other high end tower coolers, it’s clear that Thermalright did some work on heatsink and heatpipe design.

You can find Thermalright’s listed specs below.

Each of the 50 aluminum fins is made out of one 0,5mm thick sheet of aluminum. By bending them at several points, Thermalright narrowed the heatsink to 155mm, which is compatible with most systems. Such a construction should improve airflow through the heatsink and of course, improve cooling performance.

Thermalright also improved airflow by leaving a hole in the midle of the heatsink, something the company has done on some of its previous coolers (for instance the HR-02 that we tested here).

As you can see, the cooler has six heatpipes but only two were bent in the traditional U form.

Archon uses the so called “Pressure Vault Bracket” for mounting, just like most other Thermalright coolers. This allows for introducing pressure from 40 to 70 pounds.

The copper base comes with mirror-like finish.

Thermalright’s Archon comes with TR-TY 140mm PWM fan with maximum RPM of 1300. The fan can churn out 73CF airflow with maximum noise of 21dBA.

Archon is only 53mm thick so it should not interfere with your memory modules, not even when you strap it with a fan.

Archon supports Intel sockets 775/1155/1156/1366 as well as AMD sockets AM2/AM2+/AM3. Naturally, larger cases will provide maximum compatibility whereas smaller ones will require you to do some math. The following picture can help you with checking whether Archon will fit in your case.

Archon can be used with one or two fans and, as you can see from the picture below, they are mounted to the cooler via metal wires (fan-clips).

The procedure is simple enough – mount the wires on the heatsink first and fasten the fan. The wires are pretty tough and it is advised to mount them before the cooler is on your motherboard.

The manual features plenty of pictures and you won’t have any problems mounting the cooler.

You can mount the Archon vertically or horizontally – Thermalright’s moutning system will take it either way.

There’s just enough room between the cooler ant the rear panel to mount another fan.

Archon’s heatsink is 42,55mm above the CPU, which means that we could have mounted it horizontally without memory getting in the way. Note however that memory modules with tall heatspreaders, such as Corsair Dominator series, will not allow for horizontal placement of Archon.

In short, mounting Archon on EVGA’s FTW 3 went without a hitch. However, you still might want to check out Thermalright’s compatibility list, which can be found here.

For instance, Thermalright warns users that P55 might introduce problems and the company said:

”Archon’s length measures 155mm, so the first step would be confirm the position of your first vga slot on the motherboard, especially ASUS P55 series users, please take note of the following installation instruction.

Normal ATX board would have space for 7 vga slots, but most motherboard manufacturers would only supply six PCI slots, this is because the area of the first slot is often taken by the north bridge, but due to the new P55 design, there will be no north bridge, so the first slot would be used as a primary VGA slot.

Before installing the Archon CPU cooler, you may confirm by looking at the I/O ports, right below the I/O port if there is a close-by first slot, then you will need to have your vga card installed in the second PCI-E slot, to have enough space for Archon, please see below.

If the position of your first PCI-E slot is in the second slot, then you may install the Archon without any problem, please see below

Since Thermalright Archon is 170mm tall, you must have a case at least 190mm wide. In case you have a fan on the side panel, you’ll have to take it off before mounting Archon. Archon fit like a glove in our Corsair Obsidian 800D.

We performed our testing in Corsair Obsidian 800D case with three reference fans running at 900RPM (room temperature about 22°C). Our weapons of choice were EVGA’s X58 FTW3 motherboard and Core i7 930 CPU. The temperatures were measured at reference 2.9GHz as well as after our overclock (we pushed the CPU to 3.6GHz).

For the first test with Archon we used one 14cm fan. We’re talking about Thermalright’s TR-TY 140 fan (900~1300RPM) which ended up being enough for Archon’s excellent performance. The case’s rear panel houses a 14cm fan that pushes the air out, so we’ve got ourselves a neat push-pull setup here.

The 14cm, 900 RPM fan on the case’s rear panel does great to improve cooling and ultimately, adding another fan on the cooler’s tower heatsink made little difference.

We used Prime95 to put a 100% load on all Core i7 930’s cores, so bear in mind that we’re talking about a scenario that will most probably never happen. We measured temperatures on all four cores using AIDA64 (the successor to Everest), and put average values in the tables. We used Gelid’s GC Extreme paste.

High end CPU cooling segment packs plenty of strong competition but Thermalright Archon has proven that its extraordinary performance deserves a place in top spots.

If you’re shopping for a cooler you should note that Archon is 17cm tall. Archon’s standard packaging includes Thermalright’s quality TY-14cm fan. Archon is 55mm thick and if it fits in your case, it probably means that it will take two fans without getting in the way of your equipment.

We were sent a standard Archon package with one TR-TY 14cm fan by pc-cooling.de and it costs about €60. However, if you want two fans you can head over to pc-cooling.de and purchase the same package with two fans for €70, here.